# past

Pronunciation: US say "PAST" /pæst/; UK say "PAHST" /pɑːst/

## Noun

1. All of time before now, considered as distinct from the present and the future.
   - Simple: The time that has already gone by, before the present moment.
   - _Historians study the past to understand how societies changed over centuries._
   - _He prefers not to dwell on the past and looks ahead instead._
11. The verb tense used to express actions or states that have already happened.
   - Simple: The verb form used to talk about earlier time.
   - _Most regular verbs form the past by adding '-ed.'_
   - _She wrote the whole story in the past, recounting events long over._

## Adjective

2. Of a period of time, having just gone by; the most recent one before now.
   - Simple: Describing a length of time that has just gone by and is recent.
   - _The past month has been unusually warm for this region._
   - _He visited three countries over the past summer._
3. Having already happened and now finished; belonging to a time gone by.
   - Simple: Already finished or gone by and no longer happening.
   - _Now that the storm is past, the roads are open again._
   - _Those difficult years are past, though their lessons remain._
10. Of a verb tense, expressing an action that has already occurred or a state that previously existed.
   - Simple: Describing a verb form that shows something already happened.
   - _The past tense of 'go' is 'went.'_
   - _English uses past forms to narrate completed events._

## Preposition

4. Beyond a given point in location or quantity; further along than.
   - Simple: Further than a point in space or amount.
   - _Their house is past the old bridge, on the left._
   - _The line of waiting people stretched past the corner._
5. Going by a point or thing, especially without stopping or slowing down.
   - Simple: Moving by something and not stopping there.
   - _She walked past the bakery, ignoring the smell of fresh bread._
   - _The runners streamed past the cheering crowd near the finish._
6. Used in telling time to indicate minutes after the hour just named.
   - Simple: Used to tell time, meaning minutes after the hour.
   - _The train departs at twenty past eight from platform two._
   - _The meeting started at ten past nine, so we missed the opening remarks._
7. Having recovered from or moved beyond a difficult or painful experience.
   - Simple: No longer affected by something hard that happened before.
   - _It took years, but she's past the trauma of the accident._
   - _He's well past those troubled days and rarely thinks of them._
9. No longer able or fit to do a particular thing.
   - Simple: No longer able to do something.
   - _She's past the point of changing her habits now._
   - _At ninety, my grandfather is past driving, so we take him shopping._

## Adverb

8. In a direction that goes by a person, place, or thing.
   - Simple: Moving so as to go by someone or something.
   - _Cars rushed past as she waited at the curb._
   - _The years seemed to fly past before he knew it._

## Other meanings

- (adjective) Used after an expression of time to indicate how long ago something happened; ago.

## Origin

Middle English passen ("to pass, to go by"), which gives us the modern verb pass, had a past participle written passed or past, and that form is the source of this word.

Source: DictionaryAI, https://dictionaryai.com/define/past (written from Wiktionary data, CC BY-SA 4.0: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/).